Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 12 December 2023
596. Deputy David Stanton asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the current situation with respect to the microchipping of dogs and storing of such data within a national database; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [54448/23]
View answerMy Department is responsible for S.I. No. 63/2015, the Microchipping of Dogs Regulation 2015 and S.I. 427/2015 - Microchipping of Dogs (Amendment) Regulations 2015. Under these Regulations, all dogs over 12 weeks of age (or younger if sold before 12 weeks) must be microchipped.
It is illegal to sell/supply a dog that is not microchipped. The microchip number must be registered; this helps to ensure the traceability of a dog that strays and improves the chance of return to owner if a dog is stolen.
There are four microchip databases in Ireland, run by private operators. These companies are authorised by my Department to register owner details for dog microchips.
As specified in the Regulation, the database operators must provide details of microchips they hold to Europetnet, an umbrella group of associations across Europe which register owner information in relation to uniquely identified dogs. When a chip number registered to one of the four authorised databases in Ireland is entered into the publicly accessible search tool, Europetnet will state which affiliated database the chip is registered to. This enables follow-up with the relevant database.
